


Gardenias

by stillnotovermylordsixth



Series: KakaYama Week 2019 [4]
Category: Naruto
Genre: Angst, Established Relationship, Grief/Mourning, Hurt/Comfort, KakaYama Week 2019, M/M, Memories
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2019-05-20
Updated: 2019-05-20
Packaged: 2020-03-08 01:44:11
Rating: Mature
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,181
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/18885568
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/stillnotovermylordsixth/pseuds/stillnotovermylordsixth
Summary: Kakashi grieves after losing the love of his life. But perhaps there's a trace of comfort amidst the despair.Day 8: Forest Spirit





	Gardenias

**Author's Note:**

> Man, I sure held back with the angst in the previous one shots. So here's ALL OF IT. Guess it makes sense, since I'm sad KakaYama week is ending :(
> 
> Thanks for beta reading, frackin_sweet. You're awesome sauce ;)

Shadows grow longer around Kakashi as he walks. He has no destination in mind.

The ache in his joints is getting harder to ignore. He’s only 43, but that already makes him an old man in shinobi years. His body was probably not meant to endure this long, but here he is. Decades of running on unhealed injuries, constant jumping and heavy landings are finally catching up to him and he feels the weight of every year he’s managed to outlive those he once loved.

The trees are identical and he is surrounded by them. It is a forest, after all. He wishes he could recognize it among the others, the one they were crouching on when they shared their first kiss. But he knows it’s impossible. Noticing the subtle ways in which the tree was unique was the last thing on his mind when he’d pressed his mouth to Tenzo’s, trembling from what he attributed to pain and blood loss and not first-kiss jitters. His kohai had just pressed a searing kunai to his side to cauterize the gaping wound and the fear of dying without Tenzo knowing how he felt had abolished all his inhibitions.

“You’ll be okay, senpai,” Tenzo had whispered, his voice steady even though his eyes were wide and face ablaze with a blush.

“Mm. Maybe,” he’d grinned, knowing his odds were not looking good as the wound split open again. He'd grit his teeth and given in to the darkness behind his eyelids. His last conscious thought was that the 60-foot drop was not going to be very pleasant.

When he came to, he couldn’t see. His eyelids were too heavy to lift but he smelled gardenias. And he could feel Tenzo’s warmth, all around him, holding him.

Clearly, Tenzo had sensed that he was awake because he began to rock him gently as he spoke into his hair:

“You’re floating in the middle of a lake, senpai. The sky above is so blue and bright. The water is calm and quiet around you. It feels cool as it ripples across your skin. You wiggle your fingers and feel tiny fish swirling between them. On shore, only a few yards away, the gardenias are in bloom. Their scent drifts toward you in the breeze. Can you smell them, senpai?”

 

  
It’s not the same tree. Of course, it’s not. That tree is miles in the opposite direction, but Kakashi lays at its base anyway, running a hand over its rugged roots. Tenzo often said the forest had a rhythm, that it coincided with the beat of his heart when he was most at peace. Kakashi never could feel that rhythm. Perhaps it had to do with who they were as individuals. Kakashi's nature had always been one of destruction, while Tenzo's had been quite the opposite. Tenzo had always been a creator at heart.

Kakashi closes his eyes and tries to feel it, but as expected, he finds nothing. Tenzo does appear behind his eyelids though, in fractured memories that didn’t mean so much before. Kakashi sees him sitting up in bed, wearing nothing but his reading glasses as he frowns down at the report in his hand. Sees him scrunching his nose at the smell of papaya as Kakashi chops it up on the cutting board. Sees him laying out birdseed for the robins outside their window, even though Kakashi would much rather chuck the damn creatures into the stratosphere for ruining his sleep.

He opens his eyes. The setting sun finds its way to his left eye through the leaves, blinding him momentarily on that side. The sharingan has been gone for over a decade. He was given a new eye in the middle of battle, and its vision is sharper than in his right. However, that only makes it more sensitive to certain stimuli which causes the dreaded headaches he thought would be gone along with the chronic chakra exhaustion. He feels the throbbing building at his temple, but he doesn’t move. It’s a good hurt. Distracting, at least. For the briefest moment, he doesn’t feel the void in his chest.

The breeze picks up, a breeze that had been nonexistent only seconds before, and it ruffles his hair. A breath catches in his throat.

His hands.

Tenzo’s hands in his hair, he can feel them. The gentle pull at the roots whenever they made love. The faint tremor they’d acquire right after Tenzo came. The way they’d push Kakashi’s hair back from his forehead before pulling him in for a kiss that tasted of pears.

And then it hits him: sitting on the kitchen counter, there's a pound of pears that no one's going to eat. Because he doesn’t like them, but they were Tenzo’s favorite. Kakashi bought them from the old vendor with the missing teeth the day before his lover was supposed to come home. But now they’re going to rot because Tenzo _is_ home. He’s in a marked grave Kakashi has actively avoided since the day his body was cremated.

Kakashi will never feel those things again. He’ll never feel the heat of Tenzo's skin or the glide of Tenzo's tongue over his lips. He'll never get to tease Tenzo again about his granny glasses or about any of a hundred other things, really, there were so many. Or do something as simple as share a meal in comfortable silence or argue about who’s turn it is to clean the bathroom. It wasn’t clear to Kakashi then, but he knows it now: those moments with Tenzo were the closest thing to heaven he was ever going to get.

He turns to his side and curls into himself because it’s too much.

He can feel the agony rising from the deepest pit of his soul, where he stuffed it when the elders first told him Tenzo was gone.

Tenzo’s watch over the treacherous Sannin snake should have been over long ago. But Tenzo was a stubborn ass and he wasn’t one to burden others with what he felt was his duty. They’d had numerous arguments over that matter but in the end, Kakashi had had no choice but to respect his decision. “One more year,” Tenzo had promised. “Then we can travel around, anywhere you like. Heck, we can try every onsen from here to Kumo, if that's what you want.”

But after years of dormancy and biding his time, the snake had finally struck. Kakashi knew that Tenzo was more than capable of dealing with the threat. But with the village’s more seasoned shinobi assigned to missions of higher priority, Tenzo’s team had been green and completely caught off guard when the attack began. True to his nature, Tenzo had refused to abandon his comrades and actually managed to save two of them, but only at the greatest cost.

Kakashi knows it’s wrong, but he thinks it anyway. He’d trade those two shinobi’s lives for Tenzo’s any day. Hell, he’d trade the whole damn village. It doesn’t matter that Tenzo felt differently. It doesn’t matter because he’s dead and doesn’t get a damn opinion.

He doesn't want to think about it. Doesn't want to know what Tenzo's last thoughts were or if he was in pain. If he accepted his death or died with regret. Because Kakashi wasn't there and he should have been. Sure, he was aware that it was an honorable shinobi death. And they were—no, _Tenzo_ was—an honorable shinobi. But that’s not how he was supposed to go. If anything, Kakashi should have been the first to go but if that wasn’t possible, it should have been in their bed, with Kakashi holding his hand, whispering soothing words into his hair after a lifetime together. Kakashi should have been there to assure him that it was okay to let go, that they'd meet again soon in the next life, even if he didn’t believe it for a second.

His chest feels heavy and he can’t breathe. He doesn’t want to breathe without him. But the lack of oxygen only adds pressure to his temple so he tugs his mask down. The mask Tenzo found hilarious because it left a perpetual tan line across his face. "You're one to talk," Kakashi would tease back, tracing the equally ridiculous line over his lover's chin.

Even that hurts to remember and he grits his teeth, digging his nails into the tree's mossy roots. The stinging tears spill as he heaves a pained gasp.

A sudden noise right by his ear startles him into awareness. The soil under his body shifts and he pulls away, focused on sensing chakra signatures around him. His body may be slower but his senses have not dulled. Still, he finds nothing. He is alone, but the earth is _still_ moving and he blinks in disbelief as a single green shoot breaks out of the ground. It progressively grows longer and thicker, sprouting large, shiny leaves that glisten in the dimming light. White buds emerge from the stems and he recognizes them immediately. Gardenias splitting open, spreading their beautiful white petals in a synchronized bloom.

Kakashi gapes. It makes no sense, how this could be happening. Unless he’s lost his mind. That’s not too far from the realm of possibility and it’s actually more comforting than believing that the old myths about forest spirits are true. That the dead become a part of their home. Not of a structure or a building, but the place where they truly belong. At least, until they feel able to transcend on to whatever realm they’re meant to be in next.

There's only one person in all the hidden villages who could possibly make gardenias bloom like that. He'd do it around their bed when Kakashi's nightmares got to be too much. Tenzo’s arms always found their way around him, a steady hold, gently rocking him back and forth. _Can you smell them, senpai?_

“Tenzo.” It’s not a question. He knows it’s him.

Still, he keeps his distance. Any movement could shatter this illusion, this episode of madness, or whatever it was. So a vine sprouts forth and makes its way to _him_. It slowly rises from the ground up to his face and he resists the urge to pull away, closing his eyes instead. And he can feel Tenzo's fingers, trailing down his cheek. Can almost hear his love's chuckle as they trace lightly over the tan line across his face.

Kakashi laughs with him and opens his eyes, but Tenzo's gone, along with the plant. Kakashi gasps in disbelief, because it’s not fair. He needs to tell him. He needs Tenzo to know that it’s okay to move on. That he doesn’t have to stay in this limbo, if he’s doing it for Kakashi's sake. He wants Tenzo to know that he’ll be okay. Kakashi's survived loss before, perhaps more than most. He can do it again.

But that’s not what comes out.

“Come back,” he whispers. When nothing happens, desperation takes hold of his throat.

“Tenzo, please.” He doesn’t recognize his own voice. It’s choked and weak.

The aroma of gardenias lingers in the air, but the sweet scent he'd once found comforting only plunges the blade of reality deeper into his heart.

_He’s gone._

It’s too much to bear, this second abandonment. So he rests his forehead on the ground. He’s not above groveling if it means a second longer with him. “Please don’t go,” he whispers into the ground. And when nothing happens, he has to stifle a cry. His voice becomes more agitated and he clutches at the soil, “I beg you, Tenzo. Please don’t go without me.” He heaves a breath as tears spill forth from his eyes.

There is nothing but silence and he groans, curling farther into himself to keep from falling to pieces. But it doesn’t stop the flood and soon his whole body is shaking as he sobs into the forest floor, soil going into his mouth with every sharp breath until he tastes nothing but the bitter earth on his tongue.

He freezes and opens his eyes when he hears movement again. There's a single gardenia in bloom, inching closer to his face. Its soft petals catch a rolling tear from his cheek. He cries out with relief and doesn’t hesitate this time. He holds the blossom in his hands and breathes it in, sighing when he feels Tenzo’s warmth envelop him.

“Still making me beg, you goddamn tease,” he scoffs, even though his throat is raw and it sounds more like a sob.

There’s a faint thrumming at his fingertips and he notices the petals slowly swaying back and forth. His eyes widen and he gasps, a small smile tugging at his lips. Because it really is an extraordinary feeling, having the rhythm of the forest in his hands. Tears escape through his eyelashes as he shuts his eyes again. He takes another deep breath from the delicate flower and rocks himself to its gentle ebb and flow.

To the rhythm of Tenzo's heart.


End file.
